A mature oak can produce twenty-nine thousand acorns a year. Each has the chance to sustain our people, heal the world some, and spread where it can.

Friday, September 10, 2010

Acorn Processing

I was asked on my Facebook recently if I had something about how to process acorns on this blog, and realized I hadn't. Seems like a kind of important post to have, considering the name of the blog and its meaning. Different people have slightly different ways to process them, dependent on the tools used, environmental conditions, and of course the types of acorns. So I'll post a method here.

What I've done in the past is to roast the freshly gathered acorns in the oven for a bit to kill off any moth eggs in the shells before they hatch, since they'd then start consuming the nutmeats. This doesn't actually make the nutmeats inedible, it's just kind of gross. The larvae are probably even healthier than the acorns themselves, rich in protein and fat. Roast at around 300 degrees, or put on low broil away from the flame, until they're golden brown. Roast them for a bit, and if you're going to store them at this stage or are using a hand cranked nutcracker like I have, dehydrate them fully. This can be done by leaving them in the oven on bake for a long time, or by putting them in a sunny place. I'm building a solar dehydrator right now for this. If you leave them in the sun on a tarp, you risk squirrels coming in to steal them. This is a good way to lure squirrels, so I say just sit around with a .22, or perhaps set some traps around. I think I might try this sometime, if I can find a sunny spot I feel safe firing a .22.

Before I got the nut cracker, which I haven't even used much yet by the way, I would crack them using pliers. After a while this hurts my hands, and gets really boring without other people.

When they're cracked they need leaching, which in the past I've done by boiling in many changes of water, but this year I'm going to try leaving them in a bag in a river. Most sources say a day, some say up to a week. I'm going to try a couple days, particularly since I've been gathering mostly black oak acorns, which have more tannins. Some people say to grind them before leaching, which I've never done, but it supposedly makes it go faster. Because I'm using a mesh laundry bag, I think I'll leave them in halves.

After they've leached to the point that they taste good, dehydrate them. They're now ready for eating! You can grind them into meal or flour, or just leave them in halves or wholes for whatever recipes you can think of.

8 Comments:

Oh, and I was re-reading your Machete post the other day. Have you seen the new Rodriguez film by the same name? It's tongue-in-cheek gorey scholck in true 70s style, but it has a lot of poignant things to say about the current cultural situation near the US/Mexico border. Plus it's damn funny.

I haven't seen that yet, but I heard from a few friends about it. Plus, Glenn Beck freaked out because he thought it was some rallying cry for a Mexican revolt or something. He is such a racist lunatic. :P

I highly recommend Sam Thayer's chapter on acorns in his new book titled "Nature's Garden". He has nearly 50 pages on the topic, which makes it the most in depth treatment of acorn processing that I've ever seen. Also, he has lots of personal experience, so he is writing original content, not recycling old accounts. Happy Foraging!

Great post & great discussion at Ohm last night; it was an honor to meet you, Daniel. Now, I am curious, how long does one generally "leach" acorns? I knew you could eat them, but the preparation of them was something I was never clear on. Also, does the leaching take the bitterness out of them & do you shell them first or leave them in the shell?

sam thayer's books are great for this stuff, he doesn't do just the easy foraging but the involved stuff too! what the acorns remind me of is that this work was not done by individuals but by communities working together. what looks overwhelming for one person with a day job is two fun weekends for a group of friends. in the pacific northwest are programs reteaching indians (i say indian because all the "native americans" i know say indian) there how to live the old ways, to get their diet healthier and relearn the culture, and it looks awesome - in hawai'i the same work is being done with the sacred taro plant. heather awen

About Me

I am an independent "indigenist" scholar and radical rewilder, and my writings are intended as a contribution to the discourse(s) of the necessary intellectual fields for liberation of not just humanity, but the world. As such, I touch variously on anti-racist, feminist, anti-authoritarian, and of course ecological issues, always keeping in sight the interconnectedness of these struggles and the ultimate goal of free and wild nature, including free and wild humans. In this work, I seek to also reclaim parts of my own indigenous heritage, as should all people, and foster the creation of neo-indigenous cultures to stand as allies to extant indigenous peoples and our landbases.